Thursday, February 27, 2014

What Part of Ignorance Will They Ever Understand?

A contradiction in terms to be sure. An ignorant person never understands because they are ignorant and to be clear here, I'm separating ignorance from a simple lack of knowledge or understanding.

This post is a celebratory one, plus one which comes with a warning. Recently, two positives took place which will impact the TGLB community. The first of which was when the repeal of the so called "Co-ed School Bathroom Bill" was thrown out due to lack of signatures. The bill guarantee's equal restroom rights for transgender California students.

The second of which was the veto in Arizona of a bill which had the potential to send the state back to the old "Jim Crow" discrimination laws in the deep south. Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer vetoed the controversial anti-gay SB 1062 on Wednesday, saying it would "create more problems than it purports to solve."
"Religious liberty is a core American and Arizona value, so is non-discrimination," she said. Ironically, the rumor is the NFL and a threat to pull the Super Bowl out of the state, had more than a slight impact.

Unfortunately, the more victories we have, the more we need. The right wing hate mongers are more than ready, willing and able to toss more road blocks in our paths as TGLB citizens. Some even try to erode the rights of genetic women too. I can carry it a step farther to you cross dressers who maybe considering a step or two out of the closet. When I first came out, the mere fact an owner could boot me out of his store for dressing like a women, may have made the process almost impossible for me. My point is (again) even if you are a heavily closeted CD or trans person, you need to discretely vote against these people!

Today though, we do have hard fought victories and we do have a vocal and an economic impact in our communities. Smart towns know a positive TGLB rights stand attracts commerce and I do my small part by driving by Chik-Fil-A and not buying Barilla Pasta in the store. I respect the rights of the homo-phobic owners of those companies to their ideas and I have my right NOT to give them my money. Not unlike the NFL and Arizona on a tiny scale, I will do my part to help them not prosper. Just because they happened to be good business people does not make them good human beings!

The bottom line is, as with any other rights we have earned, no matter how small, we have to be increasingly diligent to keep them.